Saturday, June 4, 2011

500Friends Allows Retailers To Reward Customers For Social Actions

Consumers are engaging retailers on Facebook and Twitter now more than ever. Whether it is Liking a deal, Tweeting the link to a product, or even participating in a contest, shoppers are mentioning and interacting with these e-commerce sites on a daily basis. The problem with traditional online loyalty programs mirror offline programs, they only focus on rewarding users for simply their purchases. The challenge for retailers is not only how to track online mentions, but also how to meaningfully reward consumers for these mentions. Enter Y Combinator-backed 500Friends, which offers a platform called Loyalty Plus, which allows retailers to reward their customers for social actions. The SaaS allows retailers to track users Tweeting their purchases, Liking the Facebook page and referring friends. It also allows merchants to reward other actions such as writing product reviews, entering sweepstakes or signing up to newsletters. Each action gives the user points, which can be used towards discounts, or even put towards charity donations.